A report focused on health care employment shows the industry now plays a larger role in regional economies, with the number of health care jobs up nearly 23 percent to 14.5 million between the first quarter of 2003 and the first quarter of this year. During the same period, employment in other industries grew 2.1 percent, Brookings' MetroMonitor index showed.

The Baltimore-Towson metro area gained more than 86,000 total jobs since 2003, with health care jobs accounting for nearly 14 percent of that growth — just over 11,900 additional jobs. The area ranked 41st out of 100 in terms of health care's impact on the recovery in jobs after the recent recession.

In the first quarter of the year, health care jobs made up 12.4 percent of the Baltimore area's jobs, up slightly from 11 percent before the recession.

Health care jobs accounted for 13 percent of the job growth in the nation's 100 largest metro areas, and now one in 10 workers nationally have health-related jobs. The areas with the biggest concentrations of health care jobs are the northeast and industrial Midwest, as well as parts of Florida with large senior populations, the report said.